Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

I thank Deputy Fitzmaurice for raising this important issue and, in fairness to him, for raising it consistently in terms of the aftermath of Storm Éowyn and the impact it has had on people across our country, but most particularly the elongated impact it has had on people living in rural or more disperse communities, many of which I know he represents in his constituency.

I will deal first with the issue relating to Eir. I agree with the Deputy. I do not want to say anything that cuts across the regulator but Eir really needs to step up in how it deals with customers. I have heard this in countless locations. Eir has informed the telecommunications regulator, ComReg, that all storm-related repairs for the remaining affected customers will be completed by 3 June, next week. This excludes 11 cases where there is a third-party constraint like access rights outside of Eir's control. Eir has told the Government that everything within its control will be completed by 3 June. ComReg will monitor the restoration work until it is completed. The Government will continue to ensure that the resilience of the communications network and the capacity to quickly restore services in the aftermath of events such as Storm Éowyn are improved, which they clearly need to be.

As the Deputy referenced, the Ministers, Deputies O'Donovan and Calleary, are engaging intensively on this matter. There was a meeting of the mobile phone and broadband task force last week, convened by the two Ministers. The task force meeting was attended by all mobile and fixed-network operators affected by Storm Éowyn, ComReg, representatives of local authorities and ESB Networks. A key focus of the meeting was issues around network resilience and service restoration with a view to having a firm action plan in place before next winter to reduce the impacts experienced in the aftermath of Storm Éowyn. Knowing the Minister, Deputy O'Donovan, we can be particularly sure that he expressed his frustration at the meeting regarding Eir's inability to restore services to all customers nearly 18 weeks later. It is farcical. He has also held meetings with individual operators to address network resilience concerns. For example, he met Vodafone last week and will shortly meet the CEO and owner of Eir.

ComReg is the statutorily independent regulator. It is currently reviewing the performance of operators with regard to service restoration in the aftermath of the storm. It is also conducting a review of the applicable regulations to ensure that they are fit for purpose. It is then a matter for ComReg to decide whether action needs to be taken against operators. ComReg will send a report of this review to the Minister. There are a few aspects: looking at the performance of operators after this storm and whether action is needed by the regulator; looking at regulations and whether they need to be strengthened; and from the point of view of the Government and operator working together, what more we need to do in terms of resilience in future storms.

The Deputy also raised the broader issue of forestry and timber and considering changes to the various schemes. I thank him for the photographs he sent my office this morning. The Minister, Deputy Heydon, and the Minister of State, Deputy Michael Healy-Rae, are here today and will have heard the Deputy. I am sure they will reflect on the constructive suggestions he made.

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